Vettriano's Singing Butler in rare exhibition - BBC News BBC News Vettriano's Singing Butler in rare exhibition 4 February 2012 Close share panel Image caption Vettriano's artwork became the most expensive painting by a Scottish artist in 2004 One of the most famous paintings by Fife artist Jack Vettriano has gone on public display for the first time in two decades. The Singing Butler can be viewed at Aberdeen Art Gallery. It is part of an exhibition entitled "From Van Gogh to Vettriano - Hidden Gems from Private Collections". Vettriano's artwork became the most expensive painting by a Scottish artist when it sold for £750,000 eight years ago. The exhibition ends in April. Other artists featured in the exhibition include Monet, Matisse and Lucian Freud and Scottish colourists Peploe and Fergusson. The Singing Butler, which shows a couple dancing on a beach while a butler holds an umbrella over them, has been loaned to the gallery for the exhibition by a private collector in Scotland. Sixty-year-old Vettriano grew up in Methil in Fife.

He is reported to sell more posters and postcards than any other artist in the UK. The original canvas of The Singing Butler sold at auction in 2004 for £744,500. In 1992 when Vettriano painted the picture and submitted it for inclusion in the Royal Academy summer show, it was rejected. The Singing Butler Jack Vettriano Prints & Paintings Buy Now from Art.com The Singing Butler by Jack Vettriano is one of the finest British paintings of the 20th century The Singing Butler is a popular Jack Vettriano oil painting which many love to buy for their homes as reproductions in the form of giclee art prints, framed or unframed reproductions, posters and stretched canvases. TheSingingButler.org provides great detail on this original Jack Vettriano work and also provides resources for checking out other great prints from the portfolio of Jack Vettriano. The original sold for £744,800 in 2004 but you can buy art print reproductions below at cheap prices from the Art.com gallery.

The Singing Butler remains the most famous oil painting by Jack Vettriano from a career which has already produced many notable works. It achieved a record price for a Scottish painting at auction and is also a very common choice for customers looking to add copies of the world's best art to their own homes as accurate reproductions. The style of The Singing Butler is truly classic and this means that it normally is best suited as a framed art print which helps to match up to the qualities of the painting itself and the colours used within it. The Singing Butler came in 1992 by this extraordinary self-taught Scottish contemporary artist who has built up a huge reputation and following, predominantly in the UK and United States. The Singing Butler came in the same year as A Voyage Of Discovery which were followed in later years by the likes of Along Came a Spider, Dance Me To The End Of Love and So to Bed. £744,800 was the incredible price reached by the original The Singing Butler painting when put up for auction at Sotheby's in spring 2004.

The previous record for a Vettriano painting at that time had been £90,000 for embraced but it was around this time that interest in this artist started to explode with phone bidders from around the world vying for his best art. Jack Vettriano was born Jack Hoggan and is still relatively young for an artist which means The Singing Butler could end up as just one of several hugely famous works because this painter clearly has many years of impressive output available to him. In the UK, Vettriano is the most popular artist for print reproductions and even ranks ahead of the likes of Monet and Matisse. His success also stretches to North America too. One great moment in his career so far was his receipt of his OBE. Most artists struggle with public approval during their life but Vettriano has achieved this already, and at a relatively young age for an artist. Jack Vettriano is an interesting artist who has found it easier to attract respect from the mainstream art public than from the art academics. Indeed his fame and OBE came entirely from the public and their love for the works of Vettriano thanks to his charming paintings like The Singing Butler and the others listed in this page.

Jack Vettriano is still to be fully recognised by national galleries across England and as such is still a predominantly an artist driven on by the mainstream art following which continues to grow. Many of these followers of Vettriano are relatively young meaning he has an impressive online following too, making his exhibitions viral and at the same time still covering other age groups with his classic style that remains consistent in all of his paintings up to now. Whilst the options on how you can enjoy The Singing Butler from art prints to mugs or embroidery patterns continue to expand, the demand is there to match it. For several years the UK have chosen this painting first above all others, which is a fantastic achievement for an artist who is self-taught and very modest in character. Orla Brady is depicted in this painting and was featured again in Dancer in Emerald which followed after the great success of The Singing Butler. Orla Brady herself has achieved some fame thanks to her involvement in this painting, and she actually modelled the role of the maid on the left as well. Jack Vettriano used several models that became his favoured choices with his scenes being very carefully planned by the artist to ensure his prints were truly the best that they could be.

The profile of Vettriano has never been higher, with regular charity portraits and auctions of his works reaching high levels of interest. It is encouraging to see a living artist doing so well, in a similar way to David Hockney, the British pop artist. The Singing Butler is without doubt the best known painting by Vettriano and he is an artist who attracts great attention on the internet thanks to how his style appeals to the young as well as the old. Famous Paintings by Jack Vettriano Besides The Singing Butler, Vettriano is a prolific, hard working artist whose other notable paintings up to now include the likes of those below. And So to Bed Dance Me To The End Of Love After The Thrill Is Gone Queen of Diamonds II Dance Me to the End of Love The Billy Boys Jack Vettriano painting on display for first time in two decades - The Scotsman Jack Vettriano painting on display for first time in two decades The Singing Butler: on public display for first time in 20 years SHÂN ROSS Have your say JACK Vettriano’s iconic painting The Singing Butler goes on public display today for the first time in 20 years.

The oil painting of a couple dancing on a beach while a butler holds an umbrella over them goes on show as part of the From Van Gogh to Vettriano - Hidden Gems from Private Collections exhibition at Aberdeen Art Gallery. The work, which set a Scottish record when it sold at auction for £745,000 at Sotheby’s in London in 2004, has been loaned to the gallery for the exhibition by a private collector in Scotland. Last night Vettriano told The Scotsman that he never imagined that when he painted The Singing Butler it would still interest people and that for it to re-appear alongside works by the likes of Vincent Van Gogh was “a fate I could never have predicted nor dared to wish for it”. The majority of the 61 paintings and one sculpture on show, including the Vettriano, are on loan from private art collectors in the north-east of Scotland and cover both Scottish and international exhibits from the 1870s to the present day.

The Van Gogh work, Un homme assis avec fillette (1882), in black chalk and pencil on paper, is one of the artist’s early drawings from when he was living in the Netherlands and features an elderly man and a girl. The exhibition, which is free of charge, encompasses a wide range of styles and includes works by Camille Pissaro, Claude Monet, Henri Matisse, Stanley Spencer, Paul Nash, Lucian Freud and RB Kitaj. Scottish artists include EA Hornel, William McTaggart, Joseph Farquharson, SJ Peploe and JD Fergusson. Dr Jennifer Melville, lead curator of art at Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums, said having Vettriano and Van Gogh as the main attractions would attract a wide range of visitors. “There has been a long debate about Vettriano’s work and The Singing Butler will be one of the main draws,” she said. “What we have here is a broad spectrum of art and something which many people will find challenging. It really will encompass the varied taste of visitors. “I got the works through personal contacts with the collectors. We approached the owners and it was all quite straightforward.

“But it can be difficult to give up a prized collection, even on loan, and be left rattling around with empty walls.” Fife-born Vettriano has said he regards Van Gogh as one of his artistic heroes and that his work had been “fundamental in my spiritual awakening”. Vettriano said: “When I first painted it, I never imagined that The Singing Butler would still be of interest to people more than 20 years later. “For it to now reappear in an exhibition featuring work by such an illustrious group of artists, including some personal heroes of mine, is a fate I could never have predicted nor dared to wish for it. I feel both honoured and humbled to be placed in this peer group. “I had the privilege of an early look at the exhibition yesterday and would urge people to visit it – there is the most gorgeous Peploe, which alone makes the trip worthwhile.

A great idea, to encourage private collectors to share their treasured possessions with the public and I do hope lots of people go to see these paintings before they disappear back behind private doors once more.” • From Van Gogh to Vettriano – Hidden Gems from Private Collections, Aberdeen Art Gallery, 4 February -14 April 2012. Free. The Singing Butler | Vettriano Art Vettriano Jack prints vettriano posters and limited editions Scottish artist The Singing Butler 23 comments: Rashmi: Lovely lovely lovely work. I dared to copy this in charcoal. Its amazing – the number of emotions that this painting evokes. Thanks! February 28th, 2010 at 13:58 Dianna: I agree, it is a lovely. I liked it so much that I suggested my brother inlaw have a copy for his master suite. I also have a copy of it in my living room.

March 3rd, 2010 at 16:58 Martha Aquila: “Love your art” first introduced to your work on a “RCCL” Caribbean cruise, unfortunately, I am in an area of Pennsylvania that I have no access to your art work. Any info you can give me, so that I can purchase this wonderful art! thank you Martha, just use the links above and we will send you the art print you are looking for. Easyart ships to the whole world and with 10 years in the business we are the trusted source for Vettriano images! March 22nd, 2010 at 17:29 vahri: your art is ****…….i could do much better, screw the £774,500 what its worth i can do just as good…….**** *** jack vettriano, you **** **** May 21st, 2010 at 15:19 Lisa: I love this piece. I bought it from a friend who had paid a pretty penny. I am getting Mad Dog to go with it.

May 22nd, 2010 at 23:49 Artpassion: Vahri, Your insults and clearly uneducated spews have no place here nor are they welcome. Get a life! More credit should be given to a self-taught artist than a formally educated one. May 30th, 2010 at 07:07 Juraj Bartos : When I first saw this work, I was sure, that it was created back in thirties. It has amazing, authentic atmosphere of that period, which is my favourite one, especially when I play back some music from that time or if I play it with my orchestra. Simply beautiful. Thank you. Juraj Bartos. June 1st, 2010 at 19:04 Martin2409: This is a quite stunning painting, which I fell in love with the first time I saw it. I have not yet acquired a copy but, all things being equal, it is “just around the corner” so to speak. I find it incredible that anybody could be so unjustifiably critical of such a piece of creative art.

I am no expert in this field, but in truth I really don’t believe that I need to be in order to appreciate the full beauty of this painting. It tells a story and allows the imagination to run wild. Red is such an evocative colour, and which man amongst us would not wish to dance with a lady in red? 5 Stars for this. June 3rd, 2010 at 11:34 Clywd : This is a quite stunning painting, which I fell in love with the first time I saw it. I have not yet acquired a copy but, all things being equal, it is “just around the corner” so to speak. I find it incredible that anybody could be so unjustifiably critical of such a piece of creative art. I am no expert in this field, but in truth I really don’t believe that I need to be in order to appreciate the full beauty of this painting. It tells a story and allows the imagination to run wild. Red is such an evocative colour, and which man amongst us would not wish to dance with a lady in red? 5 Stars for this.

+1 June 21st, 2010 at 16:01 Traci: I am thrilled to find out all about this painting,as i have bought this print a couple of years ago.I wanted to buy it, from the store where I work ,but a customer got it before me.Of course I was heart broken,and then for reasons I do not know the very next day ,she brought it back!! I bought it right away.It evocks the very romance of your heart, you feel the sand under feet,the wind as the approching storm whips through your clothing,you may dance,or you may hold tight to your umbrella.you can feel every peice of the painting that the artist wanted you to feel.When art sits you down and makes you stare,whatever genre,it can take you to a time, a place,a setting,that you may get lost in,even just for a few moments,that is what this painting does for me. July 23rd, 2010 at 03:36 anne: great work, all of your paintings, there’s so much emotion in it. love it !!

July 27th, 2010 at 09:09 Lonnie: I really enjoy seeing your art work. I just became familliar with your work at a Goodwill store. When I first saw The Singing Butler painting it stood out and I knew I had to get it. Now that I’m a new commer to your art work I will continue searching for your paintings. August 4th, 2010 at 06:14 Joan: Absolutely amazing !! a true classic. August 29th, 2010 at 21:24 Jeen: cause my lover likes it now I like all of ur paintings! November 14th, 2010 at 08:14 Great site, really enjoy this work. I recommend Easyart too, they offer good prints. November 23rd, 2010 at 21:02 dave: DMB THESE ARE A FEW OF MANY WORDS I CAN SAY TO DISCRIBE THIS AND MANY MORE OF YOUR PAINTINGS.

THESE PAINTINGS CAPTIVATE AND DRAW YOU IN, BUT ONLY FOR THOSE WHO HAVE AN IMAGINATION TO LET THERE MIND FLOW FREE, THEY CAPTURE THE MOMENT, THEY ADD PLEASURE WITH SEDUCTIVENESS, INTRIGUE AND MYSTERY,AND YOU COULD WRITE A BOOK ON WHAT THESE PEOPLE IN THE PAINTINGS MIGHT BE THINKING. NOT FORGETTING HOW MUCH PASSION IN YHIS WORK, GOOD LUCK TO A MAN THAT AS BROUGHT MUCH PLEASURE TO MANY PEOPLE December 16th, 2010 at 15:22 Cita: My husband gave me a copy in our wedding day. Loveeeeeee this picture is just absolutley unique. February 3rd, 2011 at 12:58 Jarrod: My Best Friend just gave me a copy of this for my Birthday. Its the 17th of november same as Jacks November 16th, 2011 at 23:00 Rick C. Harris : This great work erupts, undiluted the romantic emotions I feel for my beloved.

I see a younger Josette & I if we had met earlier in life, dancing w/o regard to the storm or danger or others. We will always dance like this. Rick January 16th, 2012 at 19:45 Christine: I first saw this image on a wall in a bar whilst out with work friends, I now have a canvas print copy on my living room wall, can stare at it for hours and still see it differntly every time. All of my friends enjoy this picture and i have just bought a copy for my best friend as a wedding gift. Mad dogs is next on my to buy list. :o) May 27th, 2012 at 16:36 This picture brings back so many memories and emotions…truly a great work…..I love your work!

January 18th, 2014 at 16:00 Stan Williams: There is a saying “Life is not waiting for the storm to pass, it about learning to dance in th rain” I love this painting Jack Vettriano: 'I don't want to be remembered for The Singing Butler' - Telegraph Art News Jack Vettriano: 'I don't want to be remembered for The Singing Butler' Jack Vettriano, the artist, has said he does not want to be remembered for one of his most famous paintings. The Singing Butler by Jack Vettriano 7:30AM GMT 25 Mar 2010 The 58-year-old said he would rather be known for his interior paintings than for The Singing Butler, the revered image of a butler serenading a couple dancing on a beach. That painting sold for £744,000 in 2004 and is one of the best-selling posters in Britain. But Vettriano said his interior paintings, which typically show sultry couples in romantic situations, were more true to himself.

He said: ''People have always enjoyed the beachy paintings that I do and I only really stopped it because I got more of a kick out of doing the interior stuff, I thought that was more me. ''I could be the guy that dances on the beach with a butler singing, but I'm more likely to be the guy sitting in a bar eyeing up somebody who is vulnerable and I'm very predatory. Related Articles Jack Vettriano: Arts cuts a good thing 03 Jul 2010 ''I think that the success of The Singing Butler and other beach paintings puts you in a kind of awkward place where you think 'Now, if I keep on doing this I will be forever known as the guy that did the beach paintings' and I don't want to be remembered for that.'' Vettriano was speaking ahead of an exhibition at Kirkcaldy Museum and Art Gallery in Fife featuring 35 new works from the last few years, many inspired by visits to Italy and the French Riviera. It includes a series of paintings set on the cream and yellow-coloured vintage trams of Milan, which were built in 1928 and still run in the city.

He was so inspired by the sight that, with the help of a contact, he arranged a photo shoot at the tram depot with a model dressed in vintage clothing, on which he based his paintings. The exhibition features some erotically-charged interior images of couples, along with portraits and an introspective-looking self- portrait. It also includes paintings of the yacht Tuiga in Monaco, which were done to commemorate the centenary of the Scottish-built vessel. It is their first UK showing. However, Vettriano, a miner's son who now has homes in Nice, London and Fife, said his life was not as glamorous as it sounded. He said: ''You would be surprised at how little I socialise even in Nice. I go to the casino, I generally eat out most nights and it's nice to be able to drive along to Monaco, but it's nothing like these guys that have the big yachts.

''If I'm there for any length of time I generally just start painting, have a couple of hours on the beach a day, a game of roulette at night.'' Vettriano, from Fife, left school at 16 to become a mining engineer but took up painting after a girlfriend gave him a box of watercolours for his 21st birthday. His career began to take off after two of his paintings were accepted for the Royal Scottish Academy's annual exhibition and his work now sells around the world. His latest exhibition, called Days Of Wine And Roses, sees him returning to the gallery where he went for inspiration as a young artist. He said: ''I would go there for hours and look at the way that other painters put paint on the canvas and what colours they used and how they got certain effects.'' Vettriano's work has often been dismissed by critics and the National Galleries of Scotland do not have any of his work, though the Kirkcaldy Gallery has some. The painter said he no longer commented on that issue. The exhibition runs from March 27 until May 2 before transferring to London and then Italy.

Injury means Jack Vettriano is 'unable to paint' - BBC News BBC News Injury means Jack Vettriano is 'unable to paint' 29 May 2015 Close share panel Image caption Vettriano did not take up painting full-time until the age of 40 Scottish artist Jack Vettriano has announced he is giving up painting for the foreseeable future due to a recent accident. He has released a statement saying that he has dislocated his shoulder and is facing a long recovery period. Mr Vettriano is one of the most popular and successful artists in the world. Paintings by the 61-year-old Fife artist, including The Singing Butler, have fetched huge sums and his prints and postcards sell in vast quantities. A spokeswoman for the artist said that following his retrospective at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow last year there had a substantial number of inquiries regarding new paintings. The statement from Mr Vettriano said: "As a result of a recent accident my right shoulder was dislocated and the reality is that I am going to be unable to paint in the foreseeable future. "I am undertaking a course of physiotherapy but am facing a long recovery period.

In the meantime I would like to thank the public for their continued support and interest." Image caption The Singing Butler is Vettriano's most famous work Vettriano, born in 1951, left school at 16 and did not take up painting full-time until the age of 40. The artist, who grew up in Methil, Fife, first found fame in 1989 when two of his canvases submitted to the Royal Scottish Academy sold on the first day. His work has since featured in exhibitions in Edinburgh, London and New York. He was made an OBE in 2003. One of his most famous paintings, The Singing Butler, sold for £744,000 in 2004 and is one of the best-selling posters in Britain. More than 123,000 people flocked to see the retrospective at Kelvingrove between September 2013 and February 2014, making it the most visited art exhibition at the institution. Actor Jack Nicholson and football legend Sir Alex Ferguson are among the owners of Vettriano's work.

Jack Vettriano reveals the dark side that has made him our most controversial artist | Daily Mail Online comments He has so far sold an estimated 12 million posters of all his works worldwide. Forty of his images are currently available in a variety of published formats Fetish, 1998: ‘This painting is quite dear to me. All men have codes. Certain things they like. Find the code and you can crack the man. This is me in the painting. The suspenders have got to be vintage. If you give me suspenders that aren’t real, I’m not playing,’ said Jack Vettriano 'My first solo exhibition was described as pornographic. The day it opened, Edinburgh was in gridlock. People were climbing in toilet windows, desperate to see what all the fuss was about.’ Jack Vettriano’s work is a magnet for controversy. For the likes of Jack Nicholson and Sir Alex Ferguson, both of whom own some of his racier paintings, the appeal is surely his relatively safe exploration of sexuality. Safe, but edgy and a little risqué. ‘It’s a huge draw. My feeling is that they want to step into the painting so long as they feel they can step out again.

They don’t want to be stuck in that world.’ Surprisingly it is not his erotic works that Vettriano is best known for. The Singing Butler, with a butler holding an umbrella over a dancing couple on a windswept beach, is one of Britain’s most popular paintings. When it was auctioned in 2004 for just under £750,000, it became the most expensive painting by a Scottish artist. The Singing Butler, 1992: ‘On a good day I’m very proud of it. I won’t start singing Congratulations here, but I think if something is popular it has to have something going for it. The Singing Butler shoved my prices right up. Till then a big painting of mine would fetch £2000 to £3000' Not so impressive compared to Damien Hirst, who has made more than £300 million from his art, but Vettriano’s images have made him a very wealthy man.

What sets Vettriano apart from other British artists are sales of reproductions; his images adorn endless posters and postcards and are as iconic as the 1980s Athena poster of a hunky man cradling a baby. Although he sold the original Singing Butler privately for just £3,500, and received no royalties when it was auctioned in 2004, he has so far sold an estimated 12 million posters of all his works worldwide. 'I'm scared of being called an old pervert. I won't deny I'm fascinated by women,' said Jack Vettriano Forty of his images are currently available in a variety of published formats, but most royalties come from The Singing Butler and Dance Me To the End of Love. Bathed in nostalgia for the glamour of the 1940s and 50s, they earn him an annual six-figure sum. But one of Scotland’s most successful artists, awarded an OBE in 2003 for services to the visual arts, has a darker, dangerous side. People might be familiar with his romantic beach paintings.

But while many pictures have benign titles lifted from Leonard Cohen or Johnny Cash songs, they are inspired by visits to prostitutes, and Vettriano’s own obsession with sex. I meet Vettriano, 61, in his Marylebone gallery in London. He wears an off-white T-shirt, expensive-looking jeans, brown boots, a dark blue jacket, a few days stubble and dark yellow glasses: part Andy Warhol, part Damien Hirst. He talks so quietly I have to lean in to hear. Sometimes I wish I hadn’t. He likes nothing better than discussing sex and is so matter of fact it’s hard to tell if he’s testing or teasing me. Most of his observations can’t be printed, but he isn’t threatening. Rather, he expects everyone to be as obsessed by sex as he is. ‘When the composer Ennio Morricone was asked about the three things that drove him, he said: “My heart, my head and my balls.” Those are the three things that drive a man,’ he smiles as he explains himself. ‘I grew up in the Methil Docks in Fife. There was a particular hotel where the prostitutes used to work. I was always fascinated by them.

I used to visit a sauna in Edinburgh too. I took photos of some of the girls who worked there and later did paintings of them. Enlarge Night Geometry II, 1996: ‘I got that title from a book by AL Kennedy. I know Alison quite well. She writes about how when you’re in bed with somebody you tuck your knees under theirs and caress their backs, making geometric shapes. Only in my painting they’re standing up. Jack Nicholson bought it’ ‘I always take photos of my subjects. I’ve never been to art school and the one time I tried to paint a woman while she posed I realised I didn’t have any confidence – I used to give my work away quite regularly back before it was worth more. 'I produced a lot of work then. He waves his arms at the paintings on the gallery walls. ‘Prostitute… Not prostitute… Prostitute.’ He is not the first artist to use prostitutes in his work. Manet, intent upon capturing modern life, painted French ladies of the night in the 1860s. Edgar Degas won notoriety for his own paintings of prostitutes. The Scots artist’s women are never naked.

Rather Vettriano paints a suspender or a high heel or a woman in an oversized man’s uniform. The subject matter has won him some famous fans. ‘Jack Nicholson appeared early on,’ says Vettriano. ‘I’ve never met him, but if you saw the paintings he bought, you’d say: “That’s Jack!” Two very sexy ones and two that are just a wee bit nostalgic. One of the sexy ones he’s got is Dancer for Money, after the Tina Turner song (Private Dancer).’ Vettriano may never have met Nicholson, but he has dined with another of his buyers, Sir Alex Ferguson. Dance Me To The End Of Love, 1998: 'I love playing around with lyrics when I’m thinking of titles. Dance Me To The End Of Love is a Leonard Cohen song. When I first did the painting I had the couples dancing across the canvas from left to right, but then I changed it and had them dancing away from each other into the distance' ‘I’ve a place in Nice and he goes to a place not far from me so we had dinner. He’s astonishingly likeable. Great company. But I knew we couldn’t speak about art or books.

'We had to speak about football. No disrespect to him. It’s just the man he is. He’s football through and through. I did ask him for a signed Wayne Rooney shirt, but the b****** never sent it to me!’ Maybe Ferguson, famed for giving players a frank assessment of their limitations, could have given the artist some tips on coping with criticism; despite his commercial success, the artist has been regularly ‘hairdryered’ by the art establishment. ‘One of them in Scotland said all I do is colour in. Another said I paint by numbers.’ It must hurt, but Vettriano points out that such attacks have always pulled the crowds. He is upbeat today, but struggles with shifts in mood. ‘I suffer severe melancholia. Mainly because of the press. In 1998 I was accused of stalking a woman in Edinburgh. The police brought no charges, but I was devastated. 'My doctor said I was depressed and gave me pills. I took them for a few years before chucking them. They ruined my sex life...’ Along Came A Spider, 2004: ‘I was watching breakfast TV and crime author James Patterson was on. He calls his books after nursery rhymes.

I had the title Along Came A Spider in my head. I’ve been in social situations where you know when the spider has arrived. You sense a girl coming in and think they’re great news but also bad news’ He often places himself in paintings, most regularly as the man lusting after the woman in stockings and suspenders, but Vettriano is wary of how he’s seen. ‘I’m scared of being called an old pervert. I won’t deny I’m fascinated by women and the fact they don’t know the power they’ve got.’ He does have a bad boy reputation. In February last year he was arrested in Kirkcaldy, Fife for drink driving and carrying amphetamine, and banned from driving for 18 months. ‘I’ve a very low alcohol threshold,’ he shrugs. ‘I’d been painting since early morning. I hadn’t eaten. I should’ve phoned the chip shop and they would’ve delivered a fish supper. I know it was wrong.’ Later this month, the people’s painter will defy those critics with the ultimate accolade, as the first major retrospective of his work opens at Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Art Gallery. Vettriano, inevitably, feels misunderstood.

He is exceptionally pleased, then, about the accolade. When he first exhibited in the early 1990s his work sold for no more than £3,000. Now his paintings cost from £25,000 to £125,000. ‘I don’t agree popularity means trash. Enlarge The Weight, 2009: 'I get melancholic from time to time. I think that creative people simply do. The more questions you ask of yourself, the deeper s*** you get yourself into. When I was young, I never asked myself why. You just accept this is your lot' 'Even van Gogh would have sold reproductions to the working man for 20 francs. But the critics don’t think of my work as art. They think of it as top shelf stuff. ’They tend, in fact, to have more of a go at his style. One called his pictures ‘emotionally trite and technically drab’, another said he was ‘repetitive, limited and soulless.’ The fact Vettriano is self taught is part of the issue.

He didn’t pick up his first paint brush till he was in his early 20s and then taught himself by obsessively copying Monet, Caravaggio and photos. Most infamously, he copied poses from an artists’ reference manual. It emerged as the inspiration for The Singing Butler. He doesn’t help his reputation when he talks about learning to paint. ‘I was rejected by Edinburgh College of Art. It was the best thing that happened. I’d never have done my own thing if I’d been to college. I didn’t know I was teaching myself to paint. Sir Alex Ferguson (left) owns Along Came A Spider and Jack Nicholson (right) bought Night Geometry II 'I was just doing it as a hobby. All I did was copy. I’ve copied everyone. I like to think if you take all these (famous) artists and put them in a cauldron and stir it, Jack Vettriano comes out when you pour... ‘I didn’t expect a retrospective in my lifetime. One critic said I’m welcome to paint so long as nobody takes it seriously.’ Vettriano sighs, then smiles. ‘The paradox is by writing about me my critics made me controversial...

I’m not!’ He waves his arms around at his paintings again. ‘There’s nothing controversial here. It’s not soft porn!’ He stands and shakes my hand. ‘It’s quite cathartic to have talked to you. I would’ve paid my therapist £200 for this; you’ve done it free.’ And before I can think of an answer, he is gone. Jack Vettriano: A Retrospective runs from September 21, 2013 to February 23, 2014 glasgowlife.org.uk Artists from Scotland | Scottish Artists — The Official Gateway to Scotland Interactives Scottish Artists The contemporary Scottish art scene is thriving, with our leading artists like Gerald Burns, Elaine Woo, Peter Howson, Lois Carson, John Bellany, Alison Watt, Jack Vettriano and Alex Cooper all finding their work hanging in the world's most prestigious galleries, fetching stunning sums at auction (Sotheby's sold Vettriano's ‘The Singing Butler' for £748,000), and being snapped up by celebrity collectors like Jack Nicholson, Madonna, Terence Conran and Tim Rice.

Some of Scotland's best known contenporary artistic names are at the top of the World's art scene. John Bellany Born in the fishing village of Port Seton in East Lothian, John Bellany chose to take a very different path from that of the generations of fishermen before him when he enrolled at Edinburgh College of Art in the late 1950s. Bellany has produced an extraordinary body of work, including large scale paintings using his trademark mythological-figurative style, often focusing on strange half-human half-animal forms, as well as many acclaimed watercolour portraits. Bellany's work now hangs in prestigious museums and galleries all over the world, including the National Galleries of Scotland, Tate Britain and in New York, the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. John Byrne The multi-talented John Byrne was born in 1940 and brought up in Ferguslie Park housing scheme. He was accepted by Glasgow School of Art but after graduating had to take a dead-end job at a carpet factory to make ends meet. Byrne re-invented himself as 'Patrick', a supposedly self-taught painter of faux-naif images.

'Patrick' was a great success and his pictures appeared on record covers for The Beatles, among others. Despite the lure of international fame and fortune, Byrne continues to live in his native Scotland, along with his wife and sometime collaborator, actress Tilda Swinton. Jack Vettriano Entirely self-taught, Vettriano, now 53, is a Fife-born miner's son, who followed his father into the pit until he was given a paintbox on his 21st birthday and began copying the Impressionists and Old Masters. The country's most commercially successful artist, his most famous picture is 'The Singing Butler' (prints of which outsell those by Van Gogh or Monet) – Sothebys recently sold the original for a record £748,000 in Edinburgh. Never fully accepted by the art establishment, celebrities such as Jack Nicholson and Terence Conran are among his collectors. Peter Howson Peter Howson is a central figure in the so-called New Glasgow Boys movement of the 1980s, a collection of like-minded painters which includes Ken Currie and Stephen Campbell. An ex-steel fitter, Howson began training at Glasgow School of Art.

Working as a nightclub bouncer, he became intrigued by this shadowy, violent world. He now has a star-studded list of devotees including Madonna, David Bowie and Bob Dylan. For those who are not yet established artists Scotland is one of the best proving grounds in the world: Whether it's abstract or painted in oils, Scotland's Art Schools have been producing world class artists for centuries. Biography — Jack Vettriano Menu Biography Born in Fife, Scotland in 1951, Jack Vettriano left school at sixteen to become a mining engineer. For his twenty-first birthday, a girlfriend gave him a set of watercolour paints and, from then on, he spent much of his spare time teaching himself to paint. In 1989, he submitted two paintings to the Royal Scottish Academy’s annual exhibition; both were accepted and sold on the first day. The following year, an equally enthusiastic reaction greeted the three paintings, which he entered for the prestigious Summer Exhibition at London’s Royal Academy and his new life as an artist began from that point on. Over the last twenty years, interest in Vettriano’s work has grown consistently. There have been sell-out solo exhibitions in Edinburgh, London, Hong Kong and New York.

2004 was an exceptional year in Vettriano’s career; his best known painting, The Singing Butler was sold at Sotheby’s for close to £750,000; he was awarded an OBE for Services to the Visual Arts and was the subject of a South Bank Show documentary, entitled ‘Jack Vettriano: The People’s Painter‘. From 1994-2007, Vettriano was represented by Portland Gallery in London but the relationship ended in June 2007. In 2008, Vettriano undertook a variety of private projects, including the launch of a new book, Studio Life, and commissions to paint portraits of Sir Jackie Stewart and Zara Phillips, the latter of which was part of a charity fund-raising project for Sport Relief, the experience of which was captured in a documentary broadcast on BBC1 in March 2008. In 2009, Vettriano was commissioned by the Yacht Club of Monaco to create a series of paintings to mark the centenary of their world famous yacht, Tuiga.

The subsequent exhibition, ‘Homage a Tuiga‘, premiered in Monaco as part of Classic Yacht Week in September 2009, before touring to the UK in 2010. In 2010, an exhibition of over forty new paintings, ‘Days of Wine & Roses‘, was officially opened at the Kirkcaldy Museum & Art Gallery in Fife, by First Minister, the Rt Hon Alex Salmond SNP. The exhibition then toured to London, opening at Heartbreak in September 2010. In December 2011, Vettriano’s self-portrait, ‘The Weight‘, went on long-term display at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh, when it re-opened after a major three-year refurbishment programme. A major Retrospective exhibition to mark 20 Years of Vettriano’s career, opened at Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum, Glasgow on the 21st September 2013 amd ran until 23rd February 2014. In April 2015, Vettriano established his own publishing company called Jack Vettriano Publishing Limited.

Question: Which Scottish artist painted the picture 'The Singing Butler'?
Answer: JACK VETTRIANO